Seeing as how I'm racing this weekend, there is a slight taper and some adjustment of The Master Plan (which was cooked up by The Master Chef aka Cookie, the club coach). Today resulted in a scant 6 miles and stretching, with no strides. Again, it was cool, but not cold, and just incredible running weather. It's the weather I moved to Oregon for.
Lately I've been feeling amazing on my runs and just cruising along. As I've aged (gracefully?) I've come to believe more and more in the elusiveness of "muscle memory". The basic concept of muscle memory is that you do an action so much that it becomes second nature. The idea is that if you're forced into a long layoff, for whatever reason, it'll take a lot less time to learn that activity post-layoff than pre-layoff. Now, you may be wondering; running is a learned activity? Well, yes and no. There isn't a simple answer to this question. As children we all run without thinking about form or speed or distance, just because its fun. The older we get, the more other activities and obligations take our time, but you generally don't have to re-learn how to run. The same holds true for running fast or running far - they are learned skills. To run fast, you have to learn to run fast. To run far, you have to gradually increase distance. At this point in my career, it doesn't take as long to get into good shape as it used to. This is in part to a great base (or foundation) that supports the other aspects of training. With a good foundation you can build just about anything. It's a huge part of the reason why I ran some great times in events from the 1500m all the way up to the marathon in 2010. It's also pretty much THE REASON why it doesn't take long to get back to a point where I can start building again. Yet another aspect of running that keeps me at it - the alternative is worse.
Day/Week: 6/28
No comments:
Post a Comment